NOTE from 2025-10-07: This poem grew out of a conversation I had with a certain Person C. I had a thing for her. I think she had a thing for me. At the time, I did not quite realize some things about myself. If I had, I do not know if it would have gone better. The end result, though, was years of bad energy where two people who were not going to be even good friends kind of had moments where they acted like they were dating. She, for her part, did try sometimes to understand some of my ways of expressing myself at a time where I was absolutely terrible at expressing myself. 2000-2003-ish Doug was good for no one, definitely not himself.
At any rate, we went to see some display that included mandalas and she was not super interested but she could tell I was. She made a friendly jab about, "You'll probably write a poem about it." And that's a whole other story but I took her snark and did just that.
I sincerely hope she is well, all these years down the line.
Hope She said Is there Or at least She said I would likely think about it Write about It In one Of my little poems (though likely i make i t sound worse than i t is) Lotus Rose In pink and yellow She did not say what She thought She might think about it Though she was there as well And experiencing it, Maybe mostly as an extension Of when we played the game Poorly. Where there are few words To describe That particular kind of despair Of always feeling The Ending While still smiling On a first name basis That city So fragile Under glass Like a corpse It is still alive But for one more day It is still alive We make a lot of things Out of colored sand We brush them with Our hand Hope She said Is there Or at least She said I would be inspired by it